“A Real Brotherhood Started”: Brandon Lake Pays Tribute to Jelly Roll and Shares the Story Behind Their Viral Hit, ‘Hard Fought Hallelujah’

During a backstage interview at CMA Fest 2025, Brandon Lake has shed some light on how his viral collaboration with Jelly Roll, ‘Hard Fought Hallelujah’, came about, as well as paying homage to Jelly and explaining why he was perfect for the track.

Elsewhere during the evening, Lake surprised the Nissan Stadium crowd with a soul-stirring rendition of ‘Hard Fought Hallelujah’ alongside Jelly. The rousing duet concluded with the introduction of a choir and a hologram of the cross hanging over the venue.

It was undoubtedly one of the most powerful performances of the festival, with Lake and Jelly's impassioned, rasp-infused vocals combining seamlessly for the spellbinding live rendition of their song. The large, lit up cross added to the intensity and emotional weight both artists laced into every line they roared into the night sky.

The ‘Gratitude’ hitmaker, who recently dropped his stellar new album, King of Hearts, heartwarmingly reflected, “I don't think I could have ever imagined this happening even a few years ago, and so to be here CMA week, the energy is crazy - and it's back to back, just one mountaintop experience to the other. It's a real honour”.

He expanded by explaining how his Jelly Roll collaboration arose, “I wrote the song, ‘Hard Fought Hallelujah’, with some friends of mine last year, and then I released it. Just thinking about the lyrics of this song, I knew it would resonate with Jelly Roll, and I thought it might be a long shot, but we reached out, having no idea that Jelly Roll had already heard the song on TikTok a week before he threw his phone away”.

Lake touchingly went on, “He was like, ‘I love this song’. My team reaches out and says, ‘Hey, would you jump on this song?’, having no idea what's going on. He was like, automatically, ‘100% yes, I love this song.’ And we just hit it off and became bros. First time we talked on the phone for like an hour, just about life and being a dad, a husband and traveling...So a real brotherhood started, and it's just grown and grown...Like, he calls me all the time, and we just talk, and he's like a brother”.

The Dallas native emphasised how excited he was about the CMA Fest duet, “The energy is always crazy, and just knowing that it's a message that's going to bless people and lift their spirits, it's a dream come true. Every time we perform this song, several times over the last few months, it's just gotten better. Every single time, the energy has grown, and to see people taking a hold of this song, knowing that it's lifting spirits, it's giving people hope...It's an amazing track, but it's also just got an amazing message. It's just an honour to carry this kind of song with somebody who lives it out and who's become like a brother to me”.

He concluded by touching on what he's most proud of in his musical journey so far, “Wow, the most meaningful moment for me in my career...I think getting these testimonies of how it's impacting the next generation. It's one thing for a song of mine to impact someone my age or older. But it's another kind of joy to know that it might be partly responsible for forming this next generation, and the kind of faith and hope that they have, and empowering them that they too one day could do something just as extraordinary, if not more”, before warmly adding, “And for it to impact my own children. To know that, like not just releasing music to entertain people out there that I might never get to meet, but to know that it's actually impacting my own children is probably the greatest honour of all”.

While he hails from the Contemporary Christian world, Brandon Lake has been venturing into the country space in recent months, with the trailblazing maverick teaming up with Gabby Barrett for the faith-filled, ‘As For Me & My Home’, earlier in June.

After the inspiring King of Hearts, we can't wait to see what Brandon Lake has in store next - and we'll be keeping our fingers crossed this isn't his last link-up with Jelly Roll...

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